William Murray

Wednesday September 27, 2017

Christians in the Middle East are voting with their feet for the government of President Assad in Syria. With all that American government officials and the news media have said to condemn the secular government of Syria, surely no one should want to return there, with the civil war seemingly winding down in favor of President Assad. But that is not the case.

So far in 2017, more than 600,000 Syrians, both Christians and Muslims, have returned to their homes in Syria, as the Islamic State and the Sunni Muslim “rebels” supported by Saudi Arabia and the United States have been driven back. Of those Christians who fled their homes in Syria, many are returning from Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey. Wealthier Christians who fled the civil war are returning from Europe as well.

Unlike Iraq and other majority Muslim nations, Syria has a secular constitution, so Shariah law is not enforced as the law of the land. Christians have their own court system for family issues, separate from the Shariah court system of Muslims. In fact, Christian religious leaders in Syria call the several decades of rule by the Assad family a “golden era for Christians.”

It is no wonder, then, that Syrian Christians are returning to their homes in Syria in large numbers.

But Christians are not returning to Iraq, where the United States and other Western nations have established a “democracy.” Why? Probably because the constitution of Iraq, written in a “democratic assembly” after the fall of Saddam Hussein, states that “Islam is the official religion of the State and it is a fundamental source of legislation.” To reinforce this, a second clause states: “No law that contradicts the established provisions of Islam may be established.”read on...